Is Your God Large Enough For Your Needs?

Jacob did not live a strict pattern of righteousness, prior to his all-night praying. Yet he was a man of prayer and believed in the God of prayer. So we find him swift to call upon God in prayer when he was in trouble. He was fleeing from home fearing Esau, on his way to the home of Laban, a kinsman. As night came on, he lighted on a certain place to refresh himself with sleep, and as he slept he had a wonderful dream in which he saw the angels of God ascending and descending on a ladder which stretched from earth to heaven. No wonder when he awoke he was constrained to exclaim, “Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not.”

This was when he entered into a very specific covenant with Almighty God, and in prayer vowed a vow unto the Lord, saying, “If God will be with me, and will keep me in this way that I go, and will give me bread to eat and raiment to put on, so that I come again to my father’s house in peace; and shall the Lord be my God, and this stone which I have set for a pillar shall be God’s house; and of all that thou shalt give me, I will surely give one-tenth unto thee.”

With a deep sense of his utter dependence upon God, and desiring above all the help of God, Jacob conditioned his prayer for protection, blessing and guidance by a solemn vow. Thus Jacob supported his prayer to God by a vow.

Twenty years had passed while Jacob stayed at the house of Laban, and he had married two of his daughters and God had given him children. He had increased largely in wealth, and he resolved to leave that place and return home to where he had been reared. Nearing home it occurred to him that he must meet his brother Esau, whose anger had not subsided in spite of the passage of many years. God, however, had said to him, “Return to thy father’s house and to thy kindred, and I will be with thee.” In this dire emergency, no doubt God’s promise and his vow made long ago came to his mind, and he went into an all-night season of prayer.

Here it comes to our notice that strange, inexplicable incident of the angel struggling with Jacob all night long, till Jacob at last obtained the victory. “I will not let thee go except thou bless me.” And then and there, in answer to his earnest, pressing and importunate praying, he was richly blessed personally and his name was changed. But even more than that, God went ahead of Jacob’s desire, and strangely moved upon the angry nature of Esau, and lo and behold, when Jacob met him the next day, Esau’s anger had entirely faded away, and he involved himself with Jacob in showing kindness to his brother who had wronged him. No explanation of this remarkable change in the heart of Esau is satisfactory that leaves out prayer.

Is your praying large enough for your needs? Is your God large enough for your needs? Can the God of the universe who created all things and allows us to call Him “Father” able to couse your brother's (Esau) anger to fade away and show kindness to you and forgive you? We are told to “ask” and we WILL receive if we believe. Do you believe our Father will?

Tomorrow we will look at the life of Samuel, who was the product of his mother’s prayer.

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